


Strip Go (Or: How Shindou Hikaru Trained for His Honinbou Challenger Matches)

by headraline



Series: For Better or Worse [1]
Category: Hikaru no Go
Genre: Gen, Humor, M/M, Pre-Slash, boy/boy, it's important, no promises though, no sexytimes actually happen in this but still, older HikaAki, this might or might not be a prequel to a bigger thing I wanna do
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-21
Updated: 2017-03-21
Packaged: 2018-10-08 21:01:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,598
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10395984
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/headraline/pseuds/headraline
Summary: "Let's play. I'm not Kuwabara-sensei, but I promise to take advantage of any stupid mistake.""Your cardigan is a stupid mistake.""Nigiri, then. If you win black, I'll take it off."





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [IsabelleLi](https://archiveofourown.org/users/IsabelleLi/gifts).



> Somebody stop me. Or not, I'm having too much fun with this. XD  
> So. I first watched the anime/read the manga in the years spanning 2007 to 2009. If I were to pick it back up from there, Hikaru and Akira would have both been 15 at that time, which means they'd be 23 now.  
> That's an age I can work with, even though it makes it very hard to characterize them properly -a lot of their interactions in the original plot are very... well, not childish, but explainable with their age. If two grown ass men were to bicker like that, they'd be morons.
> 
> Either way, I'm sticking with it.  
> And I dunno. I have this kind of bigger idea in mind, and it's not really the happy fluff-times one would expect, consider my writing until now, but it needed a setup. And this is the perfect setup.  
> But I'm happy I made it so it can stay on its own two feet regardless.  
> Enjoy.  
> Also this is a gift to IsabelleLi, because she's just lovely no matter how you look at it.  
> so there. Hope you like it. :)

Touya is not mad at Shindou. Well, not for kicking him out of the Honinbou league right at the semi-finals, not when the game they played was absolutely ruthless and his rival’s play was well worthy of victory. He’s mad at him because he’s being an idiot. As usual.

“You’re saying I’m a fluke, is that it? We’re 13 all over again?!” granted, he could have phrased his comment better than ‘this game was a fluke’, and the blonde is absolutely livid for it, but if he’d only shut up and listen, for once…

“No, Shindou just— hey, let me speak, damn it!” Hikaru was already moving to storm out and Akira has to grab him by the arms to stop him, “For God’s sake, Hikaru! I didn’t mean it like that and you know it.” There’s a small pause where they look at each other in the eye –and for a moment, they really are kids all over again. “I’d _never_ mean it like that. And you know it.”

The repetition might sound unnecessary to the untrained ear, but Akira feels he needs to make that as crystal as can be, especially after, not too long ago, Shindou entrusted him with the very reason why he looked like a “fluke”, way back when –the whole truth, as one would say.

Which of course had been a whole new brand of freaking absurd, but somehow still typical of Hikaru –really, after the initial shock set in, on that fateful ‘someday’, Touya slowly found himself thinking _‘Of course. Of course this kind of thing would happen to you, Shindou.’_ And really, the more he thought about it, the more sense it made. Needless to say, the fact that Akira _knows_ , now, makes Hikaru very susceptible about such comments on his Go, especially now that he’s been fighting proudly on his own two legs for nearly a decade.

Which brings us to the current problem –the first one of the seven matches in the battle for the title of Honinbou that Shindou swears he will take from old man Kuwabara this year. It went well, and Hikaru won. According to Touya, it went a little _too_ well.

“I’m not trying to discount your effort, Shindou.” Again, his rival feels the need to clarify, “It’s just… don’t you see anything weird with the way Kuwabara-sensei responded to you in some of these battles?” he points to a place in the lower right where Hikaru managed to secure a good cluster, “Take here for example. Why would he do a _sagari_ and backtrack, when he could have cut you across and disrupt your formation? It’s not the safest move, but it would have given him more territory in the end. And it’s what Kuwabara-sensei would normally play.”

Hikaru gets pensive. “Hmm… I didn’t see that.”

“What do you mean you didn’t see that?! Shindou it’s a _title_ match, what were you busy looking at to not notice this?!” ah, there goes the shouting. The salon patrons chuckle at it, they don’t even bother leaving their seats to check on the duo in the little side-room anymore.

“Hey! It’s a title match that I _won_ , thank you very much! I did notice!” Shindou shoots back, before heaving a sigh and lowering his volume, much to the gratitude of the other clients –would you look at that, they _have_ matured a little over the years. “I just thought the old man didn’t, and wasn’t going to question my luck.”

“It’s Go, Shindou. You should _always_ question your luck.” Akira’s tone calms down in reflex, and he offers a smile to his rival –who tentatively smiles back, as they sit back down and resume their analysis of the board.

“But then… why throw away that one cluster if he didn’t follow it up to get me on the upper side?”

Akira narrows his eyes at the board, raising a hand to press his knuckles against his lips in thought –it makes Shindou bite back a fond smile, it’s a testament to how well they know each other that he recognizes Touya’s ‘thinking face’ and various other Touya-faces. But the prodigy’s following words make him turn serious. “Maybe sacrificing the cluster for the game wasn’t the point.” He says, voice low and focused. “Maybe the sacrifice is what we’re looking at right now, for a much longer con.”

“You’re telling me Kuwabara-sensei purposefully threw away his first match, to get me off guard for the rest?” Shindou is sceptical, but a tiny voice inside him is saying that it wouldn’t be too far-fetched for the old man.

Akira nods. “You’re the one who told me he’s fond of mind games. Would you put it past him?”

The answer is no. Old man Kuwabara has done far crazier things than lose one game on purpose to win all the others. At the ripe old age of 93, someone who fought in the Pacific war as a boy surely has loads of tricks up his sleeves.

“That bastard. Well if he thinks I’ll get too relaxed and drop my guard he’s got another thing coming.” Hikaru clenches his fists and proceeds to clear the board to start a training game together with his rival… strangely enough, Akira isn’t moving to help, still thinking. “…Touya?”

“That is good, but…” oh, nothing good ever comes from sentences ending with a ‘but’, “…by doing this, now he also exposed you to the risk of getting _too_ guarded and wound-up, which opens you to a whole new array of mistakes.”

The blonde would very much like to snap at his rival that he won’t make stupid mistakes just because of the tension, but he knows what Akira said is true. Kuwabara purposefully lost a game to him, as if telling him it doesn’t matter because it was just the first –now, if Hikaru underestimates him, his opponent will take advantage of carelessness and distraction; if he overestimates him, then his opponent will take advantage of his reluctance to take risks, and overcome him in boldness.

The solution there is obviously to try not to get fazed by the mind-games and play normally at his own best –but with the legendary Kuwabara Honinbou on the other side of the goban, it’s clearly easier said than done.

“Shindou.” Akira’s voice brings Hikaru back from his thoughts, “Let’s play. I’m not Kuwabara-sensei, but I can promise you I’ll kick your ass at any and all stupid mistakes I see today.”

Pride still slightly bruised, Shindou’s retort is out of his mouth before he even realizes. “Your cardigan is a stupid mistake.”

“Goddamn it Shindou, not this again.” Some things never change, and they still have fairly different tastes in clothing. In exchange for his great big secret, Shindou learned Touya’s dirty little secret as well: the young prodigy has always been slightly colour-blind. Bright, obvious colours are okay, but he can’t quite tell apart soft hues of blues and purples, as well as greens and some browns ; which results in the slightly eccentric choice of suit and questionable sweater every now and then. Also, Touya seems to like fluffy, knit things, whereas Hikaru prefers a more street-wise look. And they constantly make fun of each other’s choices, it’s been going on so long it’s a _thing_ , now.

Today’s cardigan is a classic example: it’s a shade of blue that Touya thought was very light grey  –not to mention it’s long enough to be almost a cape, well past mid-thigh.

“Actually, you know what? That’s a good idea.”

“What’s a good idea? I didn’t even say anything yet!” Shindou is confused as his rival briefly gets up from his chair and goes to the thermostat, turning it all the way down to 17°C and poking his head out of the side room:

“Ichikawa-san! Shindou and I will be training for his next Honinbou match. I’m locking the door so we can concentrate comfortably.”

That confuses Hikaru even more –ok, Touya can get away with pretty much anything at his father’s salon, but why bother? Not like anyone would disturb them anyway. “You do know she only lets you have your way all the time because she wants to do you, right?” still, it’d be a shame to miss the chance to poke a bit of fun at Akira’s sexuality –or lack thereof.

Alas, Akira’s reaction is flat and almost bored. He doesn’t even look embarrassed or outraged. “Shindou, please, she’s practically my sister.” Yes. Sometimes the blond wonders whether Akira is actually a monk, with the goban as his one true love.

 _‘What a waste that would be…’_ the sudden thought feels strange and uncomfortable, but not because it’s unexpected: quite the contrary, it freaks Hikaru out that it feels very much natural to think that. “Hey! Are you going to tell me your ‘good idea’ or not?”

Touya sits back down with a smile that’s almost teasing. “Ah, yes. I can’t do mind games, but maybe this will work.” He explains, grabbing a fistful of white stones, “Let’s nigiri. If you get black, I’ll take off the cardigan that you hate so much…” There’s a slight pause, and Akira drops his gaze for a second, almost embarrassed, before getting his nerve back and fixing a pointed stare on Shindou. “After that, every time one of us loses one of the five main areas to the other or is forced to give up sente, will also have to get rid of one article of clothing.”

The Honinbou challenger is stunned speechless. _‘We’re… we’re playing strip-go?!’_

“That’s… we…” well, at the very least it’ll be plenty distracting.

Akira seems a bit uneasy himself, but the slight tilt of his smile makes Hikaru look forward to their ‘training’. “Well… it’s not Kuwabara-sensei level of manipulation, but it’ll be weird enough to force the both of us to play a different game. Also, the losing player will be embarrassed _and_ cold.”

Now, there’s all kinds of rumours going on about those two –rivalry, friendship, at some point somebody made a passing comment about how they argue like a married couple, and immediately rumour-mill spread that they were dating, which they are _not_ – they never bothered denying anything or even addressing rumours, because really, people just think what they want; but still… some of the times they have been bickering, especially in the last couple of years, Hikaru found himself throwing the occasional innuendo at the soon-to-be Tengen challenger; sometimes even blatantly flirting with him, but that’s not too surprising. What absolutely baffled the blond is that, sometimes, Akira takes him up on those, and even flirts back –whether that’s to make fun of him or just comes by instinct, like it does for Hikaru, it’s a mystery to anyone but Touya.

It started somewhere around the time they became old enough to have things other than Go on their mind, but obviously both of them took it as a greater degree of passion in the game and in their shared rivalry… and yet, here they are.

In a locked room, playing strip-go.

Which Shindou got black for.

The sound of the stupid cardigan sliding off Akira’s shoulders is almost deafening. He takes a deep breath and puts the garment over his chair’s armrest. “Come on, then. Show me what you’ve got.”

“Shouldn’t I be aiming _not_ to show you?” Hikaru has to bite his lower lip to avoid smiling too wide. This is exactly one of those times where they try to throw each other off-balance, but not in terms of play, but in an attempt to discover this elusive hint of… _something_ , that’s been growing inside of them from their first proper match together some eight years ago and hasn’t stopped since.

“That depends entirely on how good of a game you give me.” Touya’s answer is just about what Shindou expected, except for one thing. _‘Did I seriously just wink at him?’_

Akira tries not to think about it. His behaviour always gets away from him when he’s with his rival, composure and manners flying out the window and turning him back into a middle schooler more often than he’d like to admit. Still, the match promises to be interesting today, and for a varied number of reasons. Some of which might not be quite appropriate for the idea of ‘pure, precious Akira-kun’ that everybody still seems to have. _‘I’m 23, goddamn it.’_ Sometimes, he feels like Hikaru is the only one actually treating him as an adult.

They exchange the first few hands, and the first fight predictably starts within 15 minutes. Hikaru is the first one to pause to carefully think about his next move.

Touya’s eyes narrow at him. “Stop stalling. Play your hand and lose the hoodie.” Hadn’t they been playing, the blonde would have retorted with something sarcastic or snappy, but in the middle of their game, his rival’s commanding tone only makes Hikaru nervous –and eager to play more to get back at him. He makes his sacrifice, then stands up to take off his hoodie and drape it over his chair’s backrest.

Left in a t-shirt and jeans, Shindou slightly shivers from the air conditioning, just then noticing that Touya also seems a bit cold, in just his thin button-down. The game goes on for some more hands, with little to no conversation and proceeding evenly, until Hikaru manages to get the advantage in the lower-left, with a pincer that would be suicidal played by anyone else.

Akira seems to be fighting the urge to scream at him about it for a moment, but then he closes his eyes and shakes his head, placing down the hand that signifies his cautious retreat and then moving to unbutton his own shirt.

As he watches his rival undress, Hikaru starts to think the room doesn’t quite feel so cold anymore.

“W-what are you staring at? Hurry up and play!” Touya actually crosses his arms over his own chest in embarrassment, hunching over the board for just a second, before straightening up and brushing his hair behind his ear with one hand.

That’s another thing Shindou’s been going crazy over. Touya’s stupid perfect hair. His rival has been steadily growing it out, or maybe he doesn’t cut it simply because he can’t be bothered to, but really it wouldn't make a difference even if Akira decided he wanted to grow it Heian era style, because now Hikaru kind of wants to pull it. Or even just touch it in general. _‘How does a dude even get to the point of growing hair down to his shoulder blades…’_ the first time he realized it, he vaguely thought of Sai. But Sai and Akira are startlingly different, and the comparison didn’t last long in Shindou’s mind.

Still, he’d be a liar if he said the way Touya’s hair drapes slightly over his bare shoulders isn’t very much distracting. _‘So yeah, gotta give it to you, we needed a game played in an uncomfortable position… and I’m plenty uncomfortable. Jeez.’_ He runs his eyes across his rival’s thin frame one last time, before shaking his head. “Nothing.” He says, reaching in his goke, “You’re skinny. You should eat some more.”

Touya scoffs at him. “You sound like my mother.”

“Or hit the gym with me!” Hikaru suggests, ignoring Touya’s retort. They already spend a lot of time together, but a while ago he also started going to the gym, just to make sure the stiff life of a Go player wouldn’t ruin his body, and he’s been trying to convince Akira to join him for a while, considering the only exercise his rival does is pretty much lifting around gobans left and right. Which, granted, could be enough, but… “Did you know I can bench press 70kgs now?”

Despite himself, Akira does look mildly impressed. “Shut up.” He mutters in mild disbelief, as he lays down his next hand.

“No really!” the blond insists, defending his pride both off and on the goban, “I’m no math expert, but 35 on either side makes 70, right?” that’s another reason he wants Touya to join –it’s something healthy to do. Even Sai made him go out and do squats between games. And if that implies locker rooms and common showers… nobody has to know. And it’s a thing friends do, right? Not like it’s a big deal.

Touya pauses at Shindou’s response, and they engage in a battle for the upper left corner. The cold air is slightly distracting, and he does feel uneasy being under Shindou’s piercing stare with his top off –he’d probably feel uneasy in any match with his top off, for a whole lot of reasons. So he tries to concentrate on funnier things: “If that’s true, Shindou… you can bench press _me_ , basically.”

 _‘Huh. That’s true. Akira probably doesn’t even weigh that much.’_ As weird as the image of bench-pressing using his rival as a weight instead, it has a whole lot of other implications that maybe he shouldn’t think about during a game of Go. “Wanna try that, sometime soon?” he jokes, barely holding back the smirk.

This sure derailed a lot. Hikaru blames it on the stripping –especially because Akira took his sweet damn time in taking his shirt off button by freaking button, so he had to sit there and _watch_ him undress. Which, come on. One can be oblivious but there’s limits, people.

It’s not even a surprise that, fifteen hands later, the upper left corner is irrevocably lost for the blonde. He sighs, and lets the corner go, placing down a hand in the middle-right to cut his losses and save territory there, when Touya’s voice nearly makes him jump out of his own skin:

“Don’t forget the rules, big boy. Shirt off.”

 _‘Wh—what’s that tone?!’_ Sure enough, Hikaru feels fifteen years old all over again, when he’d sometimes be embarrassed just by the way Touya looked at him. Sometimes he wonders if his rival even knows how intense his eyes can be. The teasing, barely-there smile is new, though. It does weird things to Hikaru’s stomach, and he has to remind himself that a 24 year old man doesn’t blush that easily. But hey, rules are rules, and it’s not like he’s self-conscious about his own body.

Shirt off it is.

He shivers slightly again, probably because of the cold air still nipping at their skin, and musses his hair with his hands to stall for a bit more time before he has to look back at Akira. When their eyes meet, Touya looks… impressed? His lips are sealed in a tight line, but his gaze is almost relaxed and his eyebrows are slightly raised.

“I’ll be damned.” Akira finally says, giving him a long, appraising look. “Maybe I should listen to you and check it out.”

Hikaru doesn’t know what compels him to take the chance, but he never had a good brain-to-mouth filter. “Sure thing, whenever you’re done checking _me_ out.”

Touya’s reaction is immediate. He breaks eye-contact and lowers his gaze down and to the right, as he always does when he’s embarrassed –which wouldn’t make sense if he didn’t feel that same underlying something that makes Hikaru want to touch his hair, among other things. “Sh-shut up.”

Granted, it could also be that Touya is just embarrassed by lack of clothes in general, since he used to act like a prude 90% of the time when they were kids and sometimes still does, but it’s usually when somebody is making him uncomfortable about something.

Again, it should be concerning how much he can tell about Akira by subtle changes in his expressions alone, but then again they have known each other ever since they were twelve, which is a literal decade, now.  So something about Hikaru taking his shirt off makes Touya uncomfortable. _‘Interesting.’_ He muses, taking a deep breath and letting his chest rise and fall with it.

His rival closes his eyes in a conspicuously long blink, before concentrating very hard on the board. Somehow, the idea that his rival is actually having a hard time concentrating because of his being shirtless makes Hikaru ridiculously satisfied.

It would seem that every time one of them has to take something off, the other gets thrown off-balance and makes a mistake in the subsequent battle. Akira’s not an idiot. He’s known for a long time that Shindou is not a bad looking guy by any stretch of the word –even if he’s _still_ bleaching his bangs from time to time, shockingly making the look work for him, after all these years –  and he’s known for a long time that, along with the pull of rivalry and the fact that Hikaru is the only person whose Go can evenly match his own, another pull has appeared with time.

Neither of them had ever bother discussing sexuality or sexual orientation, both of them too smart to think a person’s worth depends on who they go to bed with, or that you even get to decide who you’re attracted to; but that didn’t prevent Akira from feeling blindly, irrationally jealous when, a few years back, Hikaru told him he started dating this one girl he met while out and about with Waya and his other friends.

At the time, Touya didn’t know why, but he absolutely did not like his rival’s girlfriend, despite her being a lovely, kind person. She didn’t know anything about Go, much less care for it, and such her relationship with Hikaru didn’t last long –but still, that alone doesn’t justify how relieved Akira felt when he heard they split apart. Then there came a guy, which had Touya react even worse; so much so that Shindou picked up on his hostility and a very awkward conversation later the blond got it into his mind that what was needed to restore equilibrium was a ‘double date’.

It lead to Akira joining Hikaru and his boyfriend with a guy he never met before and had no interest talking to; and the entire thing was a disaster because the two rivals spent the entire evening bickering about things Go and not-Go related, and a couple days later Shindou’s boyfriend left him, with a mildly cryptic excuse about not wanting to be caught in the ‘crossfire’.

Back then, Akira wasn’t really aware of it, much less ready to admit to himself that all those negative feelings whenever he saw Hikaru with someone else were anything more than the fear of losing his _rival_ , but coming back all the way to the present, with the half-naked form of that very rival looking back at him, ready for battle...

...It kind of makes him question whether he actually suggested this idea to really help Hikaru strengthen his mind-set, or simply to indulge in it. _‘Maybe a little bit of both.’_ Not for the first time, he curses himself for not being as brave with his own emotions as he is on the goban.

Neither of them is –both so aware of their relationship being beyond any conventional friendship that ever existed, but too afraid to disrupt the delicate balance that they spent their first three years building, after going so much back and forth between hating and looking up to each other. What they have now is… good, it’s great. It’s just… the shadow of something that could be even better is right around the corner, and neither of them know how to go about it. It's frustrating, to say the least.

They keep playing, evenly going back and forth and well into yose; but in the end, it would seem this really was a good idea for training, and Shindou emerges victorious, if only by half a moku.

It’s not a game either of them would show off with particular pride, but they played well enough, given the circumstances. Touya is very still, one hand resting against his forehead on the pretence of him being in contemplation, while Hikaru knows all too well his rival is just hiding his face in an attempt to steel himself.

When he finally does and stands up, Shindou stands up with him. “Don’t.” he calls, when he sees Akira’s hands hesitantly move to his belt. “Just… don’t. It’s fine. You don’t have to do that.”

“I lost, Shindou. I know the rules.” The reply is softened by a slight embarrassment, but still stern, “You beat me fair and square.”

 _‘Yes, but I don’t think we’ll get out of here any time soon if you go through with that.’_ Not really wanting to admit that particular tidbit yet, Hikaru clears his voice. “Then wouldn’t it be fair that I choose my prize?” he asks, gathering his shirt and hoodie. “Put your clothes back on. It was _my_ training anyway, it doesn’t make sense for you to be the one who has to undress in front of me.”

“Um. Thanks. I do appreciate that.” It’d be an understatement to say that Touya was just a bit nervous about taking the rest of his clothes off in front of his rival, in a public place, to boot. Sure they’re in a private room and he locked the door, but still. Not ideal for a first time. _‘Good God, I did not just think that.’_ Sorry, Akira, you kind of did. He tries to cough the awkwardness out of his voice. “So. Loser buys dinner?” he goes back to their usual bet during casual games, “Ramen on me?”

Hikaru ponders it, and has to bite his lower lip to not have a disproportionate reaction to watching his rival get dressed. _‘How does it feel even worse than him taking them off?’_ it might be the slightly ruffled look Akira gets after every well-fought over game, combined to the fact that now his shirt is untucked and his cardigan is just haphazardly put on; which gives off the impression that… something, was done to him. Shindou unconsciously licks his lips. “Yeah.” he agrees, voice slightly more hoarse than he’d like, “Ramen on you, _and…_ ” Touya’s eyes narrow at him for that, but he decides to stake his claim and see what happens: “I get to play with your hair.”

Akira throws his head back to roll his eyes at the ceiling. “ _Fine_.” He huffs, “But no braids, or I’m kicking your ass.”

“I’d like to see you try.” The blonde smiles to himself. He knows Touya absolutely hates it when people touch his hair –he probably would have almost preferred to undress in public, but he’s making an exception for Hikaru; he always makes an exception for Hikaru –ever since the time he absently remarked he liked playing with his ‘stupidly long hair’. The thought makes the Honinbou challenger smile. “No braids, promise.”

They walk out of the salon getting some odd looks, but neither of them cares. Playing together always puts them in a good mood in the end, and Hikaru managed to calm down enough for his next title match against the old man –and hey, if he’s ever in a pinch, all he has to do is think about the perspective of undressing Touya with each stone he places down, and the chance to run his hands through his rival’s hair with every win.

There never was a greater motivator in the history of all Go games, and in the second game for the Honinbou title Shindou Hikaru absolutely slaughters the defender.

His chances are looking plenty good.

 

_~the end..?~_


End file.
